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Bride-to-be paralyzed while helping stranger determined to walk aisle

Published On: Sep 26 2012 10:02:12 AM EDT

PITTSBURGH, Pa. -

The morning of Feb. 20 is still a blur to 22-year-old Alissa Boyle.

The Waynesburg University nursing student was on her way to Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown, W.Va., when she and others stopped to help a man who had rolled his Jeep on Interstate 79 in Perry Township, Greene County.

They had just pulled him from his vehicle when someone yelled that a truck was coming.

”When I turned around, there was a semi (truck) right there and not stopping,” said Boyle.

State police said Boyle, fellow nursing student Cami Abernethy and the man they rescued were forced to avoid the oncoming tractor-trailer by jumping from the edge of the overpass -- falling about 40 or 50 feet to the ground.

“When I did wake up, I just remember being in pain. I remember just being in pain, and it was the worst pain in my life,” said Boyle, who was the most seriously injured of the three.

“They told me I'd never walk again. The doctor told me right away that I had a 1 percent chance of walking,” said Boyle.

She said her thoughts quickly turned to her fiancé, Nathan, who had recently proposed.

“At first, when it happened, I was worried that he was going to leave, and he never left my bedside. He told me, ‘You're not going to walk. You're going to run again,’” said Boyle.

Stationed at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, her fiancé assured her he wasn’t going anywhere.

Bride-to-be paralyzed while helping stranger determined to walk aisle

Bride-to-be paralyzed while helping stranger determined to walk aisle

Waynesburg University nursing student Alissa Boyle was on her way to Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown, W.Va., on Feb. 20 when she and others stopped to help a man who had rolled his Jeep on Interstate 79 in Perry Township, Greene County.

State police said Boyle, fellow nursing student Cami Abernethy and the man they rescued were forced to avoid the oncoming tractor-trailer by jumping from the edge of the overpass -- falling about 40 or 50 feet to the ground.